Happy Birthday Steve...

I love you...

He's catching up...

Today my dear hubby turned 48. Since I have decided to stop having birthdays it only stands to reason he would start catching up, don't you think? If it only worked that way. Getting older was always something you wanted when you were in your teens, once you got there you wondered what the big deal was. Okay, you became of age to drink and vote. You can't use the excuse, that you are too young to know better, to go crazy and get away with it. We are supposed to know better now, whatever...

Yum... lunch at the Noodle

Mary, Camille, Angie and I had lunch at the Noodle today. No special reason, it just had been awhile since we had seen Angie. It landed up being a treat "me" to lunch late birthday thing by these smartie's. It was fun and we had the best "waitperson" ever! Caught up on the latest building stuff on Angie's new home and then just chatted about odds and ends of stuff. It was a surprise to Camille and I when we walked in to find Megan, Angie's daughter, having lunch with some of her co-workers. Though we have to admit we didn't see her at first, she had to call out our names to get our attention. Stopped by the scrapbook store to pickup my embroidery floss box that Michelle borrowed on Sunday and pick up a couple of Quickutz dies I had ordered. There was something else I was supposed to pickup but I couldn't remember what it was till much later this afternoon. Geez, my memory is so bad sometimes!! The pictures are of Janet (co-owner and my favorite waitperson at the Noodle), Mary, Camille and Angie. The pictures of Janet and Mary are a year old only because the more recent ones I had weren't that great. Camille's and Angie's were taken at the church crop in August.

Darn I wasn't a winner...

Karen Russell had a drawing on her blog for add-ons to her Cocoa Daisy kit but she didn't pick me. :( Oh well, disappointment is just part of life and so I need to scrapbook so I can get over it. Yea, any excuse to scrap that's me. Went to a premiere of sorts last night at my local scrapbook store. They were introducing the "Creative Cafe' " by Creative Imaginations. Lots of fun stuff that you can buy by the piece rather than in packages, very cool paper, brads and even envelope kits. They will be doing featured "kits" on a monthly basis, make and takes and Creative Cafe' days so you can sign up and work on pages involving their product. The store is one of two hundred nationwide that were chosen to have this set up in their stores. From everything I saw last night I think it will be a big success for both CI and the store. Mary rode over to the store with me. I got to see Sarah who rode over with Janet. I totally enjoy spending time with my little girl, she is so funny!

My very Happy birthday

It started out with my dear friends Mary and Camille singing happy birthday to me at 5:15 in the morning yesterday. To say the very least they both scared the daylights out of me. I was not expecting that as I had hoped to sneak into the hotel room grab some allergy meds and leave without waking anyone. I received a call from my brother Joe on Saturday evening but I wasn't home and so he had to leave a message. The same thing happened when my Uncle Robert called on Sunday afternoon. My brother Tom called me Sunday morning from work but we were in the middle of taking pictures and I couldn't get to my phone. I had been with a bunch of ladies scrapbooking at the Renaissance Inn in Keizer. Then my Dad and Mom called and we chatted for a bit, that is of course when my phone started making it's low battery sounds. I received a text message from Lisa wishing me a happy birthday and I responded by saying that if she needed to reach me call home as my cell phone battery was almost dead. I sent another text to Sarah saying the same thing and then I called Steve to tell him if he needed to reach me to call Mary's cell. As you can tell by this story I left my charger here at home. Lisa and Sarah invited us out to dinner for our birthdays. So we went to my favorite place, Willamette Noodle for dinner. We took my mother-in-law with us and met the girls and their sweeties at the restaurant. We had a great time laughing and just generally catching up. Lisa gave me a gift set of Warm Vanilla Sugar from Bath and Body Works, Sarah gave me a camera strap for my camera from Emily Falconbridge and Steve gave me a new chair for my computer desk. I also got lots of hugs and kisses from family and friends. So I would say that my birthday was pretty terrific.

Weekend scrap...

It is the eighth anniversary crop at my favorite scrapbook store and this year the anniversary crop is being held at the Renaissance Inn (formerly the Wittenberg) in Keizer. It was the only place that Shelly could find that would allow the scrappers to crop through the night. Shilo Inn where it has been previously held was booked. So we are doing make and takes, giving prizes and gift bags. The instructors will be helping with make and takes, teaching scrappers how to use the latest greatest tools and die cutting machines. We always have loads of fun at these events. We rent a room and split the costs so we can scrap into the night and take naps when we need to. Camille, Mary and I will be scrapping at the same table, unfortunately Jenifer couldn't make it down from Olympia. Sarah and Janet won't be joining us either as they have tickets to see "Carlos Mencia" at the Elsinor Theater downtown. It is Janet's birthday gift to Rob, who loves to watch Mencia show on cable tv. This will leave my hubby alone for the weekend but he usually finds something to keep himself busy. In fact if it isn't foggy on Saturday morning he will be heading to the pancake feed at Stark's Twin Oaks airfield which happens on the first of every month. Here are the pictures of our pumpkins that we had on our porch. Still playing with camera effects so they aren't the greatest pictures. I laid my camera on the porch floor and shot these, that is why they aren't very well centered.

No trick or treaters...

It is the price of living in the country. When the girls were younger we could always count on their friends, many of their classmates and the neighbors children and grandchildren to knock on our door. But they have all grown up and literally moved away. We can't even count on my brother-in-law Raymond's children because at least one of them turns up sick and they stay away. But we still hold on to a couple of traditions, we carve pumpkins for the graves of my father-in-law and our son. So at about 9:30 on Halloween every year we drive out and deliver our pumpkins. I always be sure to bring my camera and take pictures. These are a couple that I took last night.